essaysfromtheedge

No Ice With That Drink

When I was a much younger man I used to work in fast food. I was a bit of a customer satisfaction neophyte, which got me into trouble with the owners. My first two offenses against the bottom line were:

1. Using Hellman's Mayonaise in the sub bucket instead of the cheap crap, and

2. Putting a small amount of ice in the beverage cups.

Both of these offenses were greeted with, "What do you think we are, made out of money?"

Now, soda from the fountain is very cheap. It's a HUGE profit point for all fast food joints. And one of the reasons is the beverage versus ice ratio. You've seen it: you order a soda and the server fills up the cup with ice before putting in the soda.

The soda/ice ratio here comes out to be about 25% soda, 75% ice.

Put that another way: 25% soda, 75% WATER. You're ponying up cash for water (and tap water, at that, for all you bottled-water freaks out there), when you think you're actually buying soda.

Most people in America are perfectly happy to be paying for water. I don't get that, water comes out of the tap every day....

Well, if the ecomonics of this rip-off haven't convinced you, then this will:

http://www.tampabays10.com/news/news.aspx?storyid=25442

It seems that an enterprising Middle-School student in Florida did some research and found that THE WATER IN THE TOILET HAS LESS BACTERIA THAN THE WATER IN THE ICE USED IN YOUR BEVERAGE!

Read that last paragraph again.

Now, next time you pull up to that drive-through, tell the kid "No Ice" in your drink. You'll get two things:

1. A full cup of soda (and it comes out of the soda fountain cold, BTW), not a 25% cup of soda, and

2. A soda free of disease.

Bon Appetite!



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posted by Tomás @ 2/15/2006 03:47:00 PM